Rocky Mountain News

'Good' IDs easy to buy
Many sell own identities to illegals, Greeley women say

By Rosa Ramirez, Rocky Mountain News
December 15, 2006

Four months ago, a woman approached Sonia Aguilar outside the Jimmy's supermarket in Greeley and tried to sell her the woman's Colorado ID card for $50.

Aguilar, 30, didn't buy it.

Aguilar said she walked away from "good and cheap documents," not because she didn't need them but because she feared that the woman might have a criminal history.

"By the way she looked, I knew she wanted the money for drugs," Aguilar said. "I just took my children and rushed out of there."

Aguilar, who is from Chihuahua, Mexico, said that she and her husband entered the country with a visa last year. The visa was for six months, but they have no plans to return to Mexico, she said.

Aguilar and her friend Maria Diaz were furious when they heard that some suspected illegal immigrants picked up by immigration officials at Swift & Co. are facing criminal impersonation and identity theft charges.

Many people, Aguilar said, sell their own identities to illegal immigrants.

"That is well-known among the people around here. Go and ask anyone," she said, pointing to apartments and homes next to hers.

Aguilar said she bought a birth certificate and Social Security number for $150 to be able to work.

Last year, she got a job at McDonald's but only lasted one day.

"The manager didn't talk to me. Other employees looked at me as if I didn't belong here," she said, sitting in her living room, surrounded by two neighbors.

"I came home that night and told myself, I'm not working until I can do it with real documents, so that if I'm mistreated, I can complain without fear," said Aguilar, who quit the job at McDonald's.

Diaz, who is a legal U.S. resident, said that buying real documents such as a birth certificate or Social Security card is not difficult in Greeley. It's just a matter of earning the trust of the seller or being recommended to them from a previous buyer.

"Most of them are Chicanos," she said of the sellers. "They know that people need the papers to work."

Copyright 2006, Rocky Mountain News. All Rights Reserved.

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